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Is it? Well is it? I don't think it is especially, but there's no real way of telling because I don't know how a society can be perceived to be going to the dogs. What does it mean? Is it something to do with greyhounds?

*Our youth now love luxury. They have bad manners, contempt for authority; they show disrespect for their elders and love chatter in place of exercise; they no longer rise when elders enter the room; they contradict their parents, chatter before company; gobble up their food and tyrannize their teachers.*

I think the current (speaking 1970s onwards) idea of societal decline comes from this obsession with the image of the Victorians. Austere, reserved, in charge of most of the world. But mostly it was just a middle class veneer that was documented. Working class life was scandalous and violent - there were legal child brothels!

It's just now our society is more permissive in that we actually talk about bad things that are happening instead of brushing them into a social corner and hoping they'll go away.

It is the same the world over. The tabloids would have people believe that child killers are lurking round every corner, criminals are protected by human rights laws to go about their business and only get a slap on the wrist when (and if) they are caught. Then you have the rose-tinted spectacled view of Britain of the 50s, doors left unlocked, childhood innocence etc. The reality at the time was quite different of course.

with the rusting away of our attachment to the old social glue of yore - judeo/christian principles - people in western society, at least, can't really claim to have any sort of common goal beyond money and the acquisition of material goods.

i'm not saying this is better or worse, but i'm not sure anyone would deny that people seem extremely cold these days.

especially as (particularly british) society has adopted more middle class values and right-wing ideology as the economic situation grows ever more precarious.

this is bad for culture and can only ever be bad for "morality" per se.

On the other hand, things really could be about to get very unpleasant for a large number of people over the next 100 years or so.

Economic disaster (Greek society is already looking pretty fucked, and for that matter it's hard not to see the social contract in the UK coming under severe strain), resource scarcity and climate change are with us right now, as things ramp up it's hard not to imagine the shit's going to start flying in a way that makes wittering about crime statistics etc look pretty daft.

If the 20th century taught us anything, it's that the veneer of civilisation is extremely thin.